Kerry was described as a “sociable, fun-loving girl with a heart of gold”

Storey had denied Ms McAuley’s murder but it took a jury just 43 minutes to find him guilty.

Judge Stephen Holt, jailing Storey for life with a minimum term of 24 years, said it was “one of the worst cases of domestic violence” the court had seen.

He told Storey: “You preyed on a warm-hearted and kind woman.”

Storey had been in a relationship with Ms McAuley for eight weeks before the violence began, and each time she tried to leave him he “plagued her and pestered her” with texts to keep the relationship going.

“She was posting pictures of her injured face on Facebook for all to see but you pressed your way back into her life,” said Judge Holt. “It’s a deeply sad feature of this case.”

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Storey, formerly of Murrells Court, Norwich, nodded to the judge as the sentence was read out, and there was a shout of “bye” from the public gallery.

In a victim personal statement read to the court, Ms McAuley’s mother Lesley said: “I can’t imagine the fear and pain that my daughter endured that night at the hands of that monster, the man who claimed to love her.”

She described her daughter as a “sociable, fun-loving girl with a heart of gold”, and that she was a doting mother to her two sons from a previous relationship.

Storey had locked the door and left Ms McAuley to die, the court heard. Her sons had been at another address with their father.